Fracking.Hydrofracking.Harsh,
percussive words. Have you heard them? Seen them on buttons, bumper stickers,
in headlines? What is fracking? Why is it surfacing
here and now? This PNL section aims to provide
a basic overview of as many facets as possible in one place; to give a puzzled
citizen a sense of the many ways this process would impact our state.

So
what is fracking?The word itself is short for “hydraulic
fracturing,” a gas industry term for a method of extracting natural gas.In the layers of shale that are under much of New York, Pennsylvania,
Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia, natural gas does not occur in pockets as
it does in other layers of rock, so the gas is not accessible using conventional
drilling methods. Instead, tiny amounts of gas are scattered within the shale.
To get this gas out, the industry uses high volume slickwater
hydraulic fracturing. A shaft is drilled down vertically thousands of feet.
The drilling is then angled horizontally, sometimes over a mile and in several
directions. A huge amount of water mixed with sand and a chemical cocktail is
then forced under very high pressure into the horizontal shaft, causing the
shale to break up or fracture. Some of the fracking
fluid flows back out, and the released gas moves into the new passages and flows
to the surface.

New York State is
deciding right now whether or not to allow this form of hydrofracking.
While the gas industry paints a rosy picture, the experiences of other states
tell a different story.

New York has the
opportunity to take the time to look hard at fracking
and make a good choice for our state.The
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) is currently
reviewing over 13,000 comments on its draft Supplemental Generic Environmental
Impact Statement (dSGEIS) on hydrofracking.The
US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) has been tasked by Congress to study
hydrofracking’s effects on drinking water.But both agencies are under considerable pressure
from the oil and gas industry to cut corners and allow hydrofracking as soon as possible with minimal oversight.NYSDEC has taken the small step of making it more difficult for drillers
to get approval in the Catskill and Skaneateles watersheds, but everyone needs
clean drinking water, not just NYC and Syracuse.The only way to protect ourselves from the oil and gas industry is to
inform ourselves – it is our hope that this special section of the PNL will begin to do just
that.